Part 2 of Bonnie Hunter Mystery Chilhowie

 Here are a few of the units from Part 2 of Bonnie Hunter's new mystery challenge Chilhowie. This quilt has a white for the neutral background, a persimmon-type orange as a medium, teal for the dark and coral for the light. And if you are keeping score, so far we have only used up about 20 percent of the neutral/white fabric but have used about 50 percent of the dark. Fascinating!

Today was a bit traumatic for Buddy. A comment on the last post suggested that he might have been responsible for scrabbling the strips and causing numerous errant strip sets. He could barely take a serious beauty nap because of all the laughter from Molly.

She was laughing at me, not Buddy. Molly insisted that I show the mess next to the sewing machine. She suspects that if Buddy did start moving strips around, the pile could only get neater given my strips are as close to absolute chaos as possible. But I do appreciate the assumption that I work in an orderly way and that only a cat could cause human error.

Bonnie Hunter Mystery 2022

 Bonnie Hunter started her mystery challenge Chilhowie last week and I was so pleased that she eased us into the challenge with some simple four-patches and nine patches. [Insert sound of loud record scratch].

It turns out what is easy in my theoretical brain turned into long sessions with my seam ripper. And maybe some cussing. But let's go back a step to color choices...I like teal/aqua and orange, but didn't want to revisit a purple and orange quilt. So instead of having the orange as a medium bright, I moved aqua/teal to the dark, and orange (that is, coral) to the light. The background is still white. For medium bright, I am planning on a multicolor (or a few friendly multicolors) fabric that I expect to jump out of my stash sometime along the way.

Meanwhile, let's discuss where theory and reality don't match. Essentially all I had to do for the strip sets were dark teal strips with coral on either side and coral with white on either side. When I took my strip sets to the ironing board I found all sorts of combinations...teal surrounded by white and orange surrounded by teal. And yes, one strip set was orange with a white strip sewn to a white strip. !!!

This was not one night of bad sewing...but repeated throughout the week.

And maybe my language behavior may have required a teacher-parent conference.

Orange for Thanksgiving

 I switched over to this project for a change of pace. 

Of course, the audit took longer than the block construction.

And apparently one is supposed to go outside occaisionally and look around.

And finally, if you prefer your turkey as a balloon animal...please enjoy:  https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2022/11/masayoshi-matsumoto-balloon-animals/

The End of Matchmaking

The smallish spools are taking up most of my sewing time. The bottom box shows all of the pairs except for a pile next to the sewing machine (that I was too lazy to include in this photo). In the box at the top are the four patches. I find it interesting that single spools are unwieldy, and the pairs are barely manageable. But the four patches, with their spun seams on the back, lay nice on flat. And I should note that I ironed the single spools, but won't iron them again until they are 16-patches.

Meanwhile, if you are missing an orange cat, it may be over here. The day I moved in (over 5 years ago) there was an evil mostly black cat that insisted this was his territory. Recently when I was out working in the garden, he stared at me and sprayed the shed, making the same point. (Now we know why he is outside all the time.) And then there is the pitiful white cat that was hanging out under the front window...unable to stir my cats from their heated beds. And finally the newest cat...an orange fellow...marched along the fence and glared at me.

On the Light Side

Here are some more light spools I made to match up with more spools of medium value. Okay, a few dark value spools too.

Meanwhile, I have been spending time cleaning up the backyard garden. I admit to neglecting it when it transitioned from a shade garden to a very sunny and sometimes overly hot garden. And with a strong nod toward metaphor, most of the plants/weeds that I am trying to clear out are loaded with thorns: blackberries, holly, thistle and a couple out of control roses. To prove the point, there was a baby thorned honey locust...that I had to look up because I have never seen a sapling with such evil intent. When I went inside to tell my cats, they just chewed on their claws with their fangs.

Not so Tiny After All Spools

 Yes, this photo has a yellow cast...and I either have to set up better lighting or sew earlier in the day to take photos during the day. In any case, while I was busy fussing with pairing off the last piles of single spools, the four patches got together to form eight patches.

And I have to apologize because I have been referring to these as microspools when they are a whopping 1.5 inches finished. Definitely not worthy of the term micro. In his book The Anthropocene Reviewed, John Green begins his chapter on Viral Meningitis:  "I find it difficult to grasp the size of viruses. As individuals, they are tiny. A red blood cell is about a thousand times bigger than a Sars COV-2 virus. But as a group, viruses are unfathomably numerous, There are about ten million viruses in a single drop of sea water."

If you would like to see some real micro quilting, please enjoy Alex Anderson's interview with Amy Pabst on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FM-KATsG22g

Frames

In November 2020, Lynn Dykstra started a calendar quilt where she framed a fabric for each day...and you can read about it here: https://kleinmeisjequilts.blogspot.com/2021/11/62-to-63-calendar-quilt-in-time-of.html

I was inspired by hers and started mine...and while she had 365 blocks one year later, I had two. I decided to add to mine today and I was so productive I had an eight fold increase in blocks. 

These are made with a 2.5 inch square surrounded by 1.25 inch strips.

Spools Anonymous

 I can stop making spools anytime. It's no big deal. Just thought it would be nice to have some more spools to pair with some of the spools I had already made that needed pairs...dark ones to pair with light medium ones and light ones to pair with dark medium ones. And besides, I already have a lot of 1 inch by 2 inch background rectangles cut and I wouldn't want to waste those. Although maybe I should cut some more because variety is nice. Plus I know I don't have a serious problem because at no time have I snuck up behind someone and snipped a 2 inch by 3 inch rectangle out of their clothing. Case closed.

Diversion

 My cats are spending more time in their heated beds...which gives me some time to divert my attention to more hard working cats. First diversion is to see Jeremy Mayer's sculptures made from typewriter parts...my favorites are the birds...which I discovered on This Is Colossal Art blog.

When I moved to Mastodon this week, I found This is Colossal there and they linked me to @jeremymayer@mastodon.art. And if you would like to see a hard working cat, here you go:  https://mastodon.art/@jeremymayer/109325920702829818

And here's the link to his website: https://jeremymayer.com/Artist.asp?ArtistID=18688&Akey=23SVCF6T&ajx=1

More Spooling Around

 Today some single spools paired off, while some pairs became foursomes. And now that I see this picture, I realize I need to extract the red stripe spool with the gray background (bottom left) because its easier to remove now than later.

These are the single spools still looking for a friend.

In other news, Sheepish (the sheep quilt) won second place, viewers' choice (in its category) at the Clark County Quilt Show. I told the sheep it did not beHOOF them to BrAAAAg, but they all pretended not to hear me. (If you suspect that a pickle dish quilt won first prize in the same category, you would be right.)

Lights and Darks

I have a lot of medium value microspools for whom I could not find a pairing with enough contrast. So I have made more very dark spools and very light spools. But maybe it's just that I can't stop making spools.

Meanwhile, I am seriously thinking of changing the name of this blog to The Objects of Obstruction.

Easy Does It

Here are four blocks that Bonnie Hunter used in her leaders/enders called Easy Breezy. However, I only considered making it when I saw it on Kathy's Quilts. I love how she made the colors move across the quilt.

Hexed

Tula Pink's new line Moon Garden was a bit of a challenge for making hexes...the animal images are large and spaced out, but I didn't want to drill a hole in the middle of the yardage. And speaking of animal challenges, I have joined the migration from a bird app to a mastodon app. 

Buddy worries that I will ask him to start thinking blog posts again when what he really wants to do is work on the launch of his Purring Podcast.

Apology Accepted

Some days just disappear. You realize the highlight of the day was Buddy playing with his Flurff...a butterfly attached to a spinning disk. However, maybe some jokes were made at Buddy's expense so he rejects my request for a photo recreating the scene.

But some times, apologies and bribes are made and accepted.

Boxed In

 Today, a box of two-patches became four patches. But it is a small box.

A Molly-sized box.

Going for a Swim

 Time to bring the seahorse project back...happily I already had the pieces...but unhappily I realized half way through that I had changed the pattern and had to refigure that out...and now that I am looking at it online, I realize I left off a corner in the tail,..

I'll let the seahorse with the misshapen tail swim with his friends, until he sinks to the bottom of the design wall.

Move to Hexies

 Buddy requested that I throw away the spools to make more room for his toys. He thought I should work on the hexie quilt because its easily stored in a small bin. These are cuts I made today.

In case it wasn't obvious, I am using animals as the theme. Here are some earlier cuts, plus some of the hexies I have already based on the paper. Revisiting this project, I realize that I have lots of cut hexies and not enough sewn. We are having a windy night, so this will be the perfect project if we lose power.

The Never-ending Spool

I have been culling pairs without enough contrast and plan to recycle them back into the project. However, I already have 900 pairs. I had started to sort them by the color of the darkest spool, but while I was sleeping, Buddy unsorted them. He also dropped his possum toy on top of the pile so I wouldn't know who was to blame. (Sometimes I will find possum at the food dish, sometimes he comes to the bedroom, then back to the sewing room).

Here are the four-patches I have made so far. As a reminder, the key challenge to this quilt is that it is a charm quilt, where each spool is made from a different fabric. Unfortunately, as I was sorting pairs, I found a duplicate fabric!!!! This means my strategy for removing duplicates was not foolproof and my only remedy is to pack this project away and never think of it again.

 

Performance

Today I had my performance review. Molly thinks I don't provide a safe living environment. She noted that in the sewing room alone she risks cuts, punctures and burns, and my preference for quilting must be stoked by a lust for danger. I told her she forgot about the threat of suffocation from an avalanche of fabric. Molly was not amused.

Buddy focused only on my blogging role. He recommended I provide less words and pictures but more thinking.

Today, I only unsewed some spools so I will have to supplement this post with more quilts from the Clark County Quilters show...moving now to improv.

Here is the description.

This was an interesting spin on a familiar format.

And the description.

This quilt received three ribbons, and it stood out for its original design. Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of the description. The quilt guild did take photos of the entire show and have made the images available on a flash drive. So hopefully it will include this quilts' description. I also didn't take a picture of the overall winner...it was a "realistic" fused scene with a dragon. 

More Spools

Today I sewed more four patches. Unfortunately, I forgot they are directional with a dark spool in the upper left corner, so I have some seam ripping to do. While I was sewing, Molly came to visit. I thought she was far enough away until her tail swept by the moving needle. I now have to spend the next month or so arguing with myself about whether she did it deliberately, Given my frightened reaction, she will most certainly try it again.

Here is another Bonnie Hunter design from the Clark County Quilt show. Made to full size, her mystery challenge quilts are quite large. And while we're on the topic, today Bonnie Hunter released the colors for the next mystery challenge...with the first set of instructions to be released the day after Thanksgiving. You can find her color discussion here:  https://quiltville.blogspot.com/2022/10/chilhowie-quiltville-mystery.html

And yes, this morning Buddy was still waiting for staff to clean up his play area.

Spooling Around

Yesterday I pulled out the spool project, took inventory and started sorting. I went through and ironed four patches with points that meet (and happily only had to send five back for reworking). Then I sorted two patches and singles. My plan is to have darks and lights on alternate diagonals throughout the quilt, but value is relative. So I'm trying to make good decisions in the early stages, but won't lay the blocks out until I have eight by eights. (Each block is 2 inches unfinished).

Buddy, however, didn't agree with my sorting criteria.

As I started to resort, Buddy joined me and explained that I was trespassing in his play area...as you can tell by the mouse right above his head.  He also thanked me for the new slip and slide toys.

And here is a companion to the first place quilt from the Clark County quilt show (shown yesterday)...apparently there is a special group for OCD quilters.

Here is the maker of the quilt and her explanation of her role in the OCD conspiracy.

And here is a closeup.

Attention Deficit Disorder

A certain cat with attention deficit disorder is not happy with my taking blogging responsibilities from Buddy. She is using my arm as her head rest in a determined effort to make typing as difficult as sewing and that she continues to have 100% of my attention.

That said, I am now using an updated version of Photoshop Elements and that seems to have taken care of the weird discoloration I was getting with the other photo program. So that is making things easier. Also, I remember the keyboard shortcuts which reduces Molly Cat disruption.

And yes I am continuing to fuss with the Shards quilt (from Kaffe Fassett). When I put it up on the design wall again I found I was two blocks short...then I made some replacements for blocks that were too dark...or to yellow. And I now realize that I prefer making the shard blocks more than the quilt itself. Oh well...

At the Clark County Quilters' show, this quilt was hanging next to the sheep quilt. The sheep were not too happy and thought that OCD quilts should be hung in a separate area. I tried to reassure them that fine workmanship is not contagious.

Here is the quilt description (without the appropriate psychiatric diagnosis included).